Railway skate



April 14, 1964 H. H` SM'HH 3,128,123

RAILWAY SKATE u uli INH Filed Oct. 20, 1961 United States Filed Oct. 20,1961, Ser. No. 146,430 Claims. (Cl. 1041-260) This invention relates toa new and improved railway skate for use with mine cars and similarvehicles used on railway tracks.

There is a need today in mines and service car locations for a railwayskate that can be used for a protracted period of time without requiringfrequent repair or replacement.

Many railway skates of this general type are currently available on themarket, but they are either too complex in design, or they make noallowance for use beyond minimal wear. Such a skate is normally employedin mines and similar establishments where the cars are not equipped withbrakes. Because the customarily employed mine car is not equipped withbrakes, the locomotive must furnish all braking effort. When operatingon relatively at ground few problems are encountered, but when the trainis descending a slope, the engine is frequently unable to control thedownhill speed of the train. To assist in braking the train, a skate ismounted on a track adjacent the Wheel. The wheel then rides up onto theskate and the skate is pushed along the track. The friction between thetrack head and the skate augments the braking effort of the locomotive.The abrading effect of the track head on the skate skid surface is theprincipal cause of the short life of the skate. The wear on the skate bythe railhead and the heat generated by the skate sliding along the railresults in the warping and distortion of the skate bar due to a loss ofstrength in the skate bar per se, thereby causing the bar to beprematurely discarded. Further, if the skid bar is wider than the rail,undesirable projections on the skate skid surface are formed at the sideof the worn surface.

It is therefore the primary object of this invention to provide animproved skate for railway use which allows for wear of the skid surfacewithout creating undesirable projections that have a deleterious effecton the functioning of the skid.

It is another object of this invention to provide a skate for railwayuse having at least two upwardly facing surfaces adapted for engagementwith a wheel of a rail vehicle, the underside of the skate beingrecessed along one edge to allow for wear of the surface and to providefor heat dissipation.

Another object of this invention is to provide a railway skate barhaving a wheel bearing surface of greater lateral width than that of itsrail bearing skid surface in order to compensate for loss of strengthduring operation due to the presence of heat and cumulative wear on theskid surface. Still another object is to provide an improved skate forrailway use which not only maintains its resistance to deformation butalso improves its rate of heat dissipation.

These and other objects will become more apparent from the followingdescription and claims in which:

FIG. l is a plan view of a skate embodying the invention;

FIG. 2 is a side view of a skate embodying the invention;

FIG. 3 is an end View of a skate embodying the invention;

FIG. 4 is a perspective view of a skate embodying the invention inengagement with the wheel of a rail vehicle;

FIG. 5 is a vertical section of a worn skate of conventional design;

Patent O FIG. 6 is a vertical section taken along line VI-VI of FIGS. 1and 2;

FIG. 7 is an end view of a skate embodying the invention mounted on arailhead in engagement with a wheel.

FIG. 8 is a fragmental side elevation of a modified skate conforming tothe invention.

Referring to FIG. l, the skate as shown has a skid bar 2, handle portion4, and abutment post 6 integrally formed. The upper end of abutment post6 has an upwardly facing abutment surface 8 adapted to receive a carwheel in abutting relationship. Extending outwardly from the handleportion 4 is the skid bar 2.

The skate on its obverse side has a ridge 10 that has its longitudinalaxis oriented transverse to that of the skate. In the preferredembodiment the ridge has a surface 12 on the handle side curvedconcavely about the same center of curvature as abutment surface 8. Bycurving these two surfaces at approximately the same radius of curvatureas the tread surface of the wheel on the car, full surface-to-wheelcontact is obtained along both surfaces 8 and 12 to firmly hold thewheel in engagement with the skate. Thus the surfaces 8 and 12 are bothlongitudinally and laterally inclined with respect to the plane of theskid surface. In FIG. 7 the full surfaceto-surface engagement of thewheel with surface 12 is clearly shown. A similar result can be achievedby leaving these surfaces, as illustrated in FIG. 8, and wedging thewheel into engagement with the skate.

The underside of the skate is characterized by a depending side fiange14 extending along the length of a skid surface 16. When mounted on thetrack, the flange 14 is disposed beneath the wheel between the railheadand a wheel flange 17 as shown in FIGS. 4 and 7 so that the skate ismaintained in position on the rail. The skid bar 2 is relieved orrecessed as at 18 on its underside along the edge thereof opposite tothat of flange 14. The width of recess 1S relative to fiange 14 and skidsurface 16 can best be seen in FIG. 3. Recess 18 is defined by asubstantially vertical surface Ztl and a top surface 22 which extendalong the full length of the skid bar. It is the purpose of this recessto allow skid surface 16 under abrading action to be worn down to thelevel of surface 22 of the recess without forming a projection on theunderside of the skid bar. In addition, a flange 21 formed by the recess18 and the top of the skid bar 2 provides for rapid heat dissipation. Ithas been found from experience that the rapid heat dissipation providedby the cooling function of the flange 21 increases the service life ofthe skate substantially.

FIG. 5 illustrates a typical `skate which has been worn until aprojecting ridge 23 has been formed. The dotdash line in FIG. 5indicates the position of skid surface 16 prior to use. Once formed, theprojecting ridge 23 presents serious problems in the use of the skate.The worn skate shown in FIG. 5 cannot be used where there are switchesin the track because the projection 23 will frequently cause derailmentof the associated rail vehicle.

It would not be possible to preclude the formation of projection 23 onthe underside of the skate merely by constructing the skate with anarrower skid and obverse side portion. The full width of the skate isnecessary to enable the upwardly facing obverse side to fully engage thewheel of the car. Thus, there is provided an alternative to reducing thewidth of the skid surface to that wear pattern as herein disclosed.

After extended use under adverse conditions, it has been found that theend of the conventional skid bar opposite from that of the handle has atendency to curl, upwardly toward the wheel. By curling upwardly, thefrictional resistance between -the skate and railhead is reduced due toa loss in surface area of the skate in contact with the railhead. Inaddition, it becomes more difficult to dissipate the friction-generatedheat. Thus, by increasing the width of the obverse side of the skid barwhile maintaining the skid surface at a lesser width, such as that of arailhead, the cross sectional area of the bar located between theobverse side and the skid surface is maintained at a level providingsatisfactory strength and heat dissipation. Further, to overcome thistendency of the skid bar to curl, the ridge is so positioned on theskate that it functions as a wedge between the wheel and skid bar. Thus,the wheel by abuttingly engaging surfaces 8 and 12 forces the ridge 10outwardly to assist in maintaining the full length of the skid bar incontact with the railhead.

The upper surface of the skid bar has been modied over prior artconstructions by the addition of two concavely curved surfaces adaptedfor full surface-to-wheel engagement. By thus curving these surfaces, itis possible for movement between the wheel and the skate to be minimizedand thereby reduce wear on the skate and the wheel. With this movementminimized, the skate can function not only to brake a train of cars whendescending a slope, but can be used to fix a car, or a train, in oneposition on a relatively flat section of track to function as a parkingbrake.

FIG. 8 illustrates an alternative embodiment of the invention whereinwheel-engaging abutment surfaces, i.e., surfaces 8a and 12a are planateor at and inclined relative to the longitudinal direction of the skate.By having the surfaces flat, the wheel of a mine car can be wedged intoposition on the skate and thereby minimize movement between the mine carwheel and the skate. This alternative form of construction is deemed tobe within the scope of the invention herein disclosed.

What has been disclosed herein is a simple way to make a railway skatethat increases its use for an extended period of time over existingskates by making provision for wear on the skid surface, and byproviding improved skate-to-wheel contact.

The terms and expressions which have been employed are used as terms ofdescription and not of limitation and there is no intention of excludingsuch equivalents of the invention described or of the portions thereofas fall within the scope of the claims.

What is claimed is:

1. A railway skate comprising: a skid bar having a skid surface on theunderside thereof adapted for engagement with a railhead, a dependingrail-engaging flange along one edge of said surface, and a topwheelengaging surface; said top surface of the bar being substantiallywider in a direction away from said flange than the combined widths ofthe flange and said skid surface, and the width of the skid surfaceconforming substantially to the Width of a railhead; said top surfacebeing wider than the skid surface to provide good wheel-supporting andheat-dissipation characteristics of the skate.

2. A railway skate comprising: a skid bar having a downwardly-facingskid surface adapted for engagement with a railhead; a dependingrail-engaging flange adjacent one edge of said surface, and a topwheel-engaging surface; the skid bar having a recess along an edgethereof opposite said one edge of said skid surface and parallel to saidflange; said top surface of the bar being wider in a direction away fromsaid flange than the combined Widths of the flange and said skid surfaceby a difference approximately equal to the lateral width of said recess,and the width of the skid surface conforming substantially to the widthof the railhead.

3. The railway skate of claim 2 wherein: the skid bar comprises anupstanding abutment and a wheel-engaging ridge in longitudinally spacedrelation to said abutment extending the full width of said top surface,said ridge and said abutment adapted for engagement with a wheel of arail vehicle in wedging relationship therewith.

4. The railway skate of claim 2 wherein: the skid bar comprises alaterally extending ange having a width substantially equal to thelateral width of said recess thereby forming a marginal portion of saidtop surface and partially forming said recess adjacent said skidsurface.

5. The railway skate of claim 1 wherein: the skid bar comprises anupstanding abutment and a ridge longitudinally spaced from said bar,said abutment and said ridge providing portions of said wheel engagingsurface both longitudinally and laterally inclined with respect to theplane of said skid surface for substantial contact with a wheel having atapered or conical tread surface.

References Cited in the tile of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS834,298 Harris Oct. 30, 1906 1,343,614 Buell June 15, 1920 2,170,523Wilcox Aug. 22, 1939 2,290,505 Summerour July 21, 1952

1. A RAILWAY SKATE COMPRISING: A SKID BAR HAVING A SKID SURFACE ON THEUNDERSIDE THEREOF ADAPTED FOR ENGAGEMENT WITH A RAILHEAD, A DEPENDINGRAIL-ENGAGING FLANGE ALONG ONE EDGE OF SAID SURFACE, AND A TOPWHEELENGAGING SURFACE; SAID TOP SURFACE OF THE BAR BEING SUBSTANTIALLYWIDER IN A DIRECTION AWAY FROM SAID FLANGE THAN THE COMBINED WIDTHS OFTHE FLANGE AND SAID SKID SURFACE, AND THE WIDTH OF THE SKID SURFACECONFORMING SUBSTANTIALLY TO THE WIDTH OF A RAILHEAD; SAID TOP SURFACEBEING WIDER THAN THE SKID SURFACE TO PROVIDE GOOD WHEEL-SUPPORTING ANDHEAT-DISSIPATION CHARACTERISTICS OF THE SKATE.